Chilliwack
Site Information
Number of Residents: 8 CMG, 1 IMG
Location: Chilliwack, BC
Community: 92,000
Hospital: Chilliwack General Hospital
Distance from Vancouver: 103 KM
Curriculum Type: Partial Integrated
R2 Elective Time: 12 Weeks
Site Director Message
Thank you for your interest in the Chilliwack site of the UBC Family Practice Residency Program. I trust the information provided here will help you to consider Chilliwack as an option for your family practice residency. Chilliwack is a vibrant city of approximately 100 km east of Vancouver, BC. The hospital services an area of about 90,000-100,000 people. Family physicians form the backbone of the care model at our hospital. All family practice preceptors have hospital privileges and provide the majority of care for inpatients. When required, there is specialist support from internal medicine, general surgery, orthopedic surgery, urology, pediatrics, rheumatology, obstetrics, gynecology, ophthalmology, and ENT.
Chilliwack’s current hospital model provides residents with exceptional learning experiences. The absence of hospitalists and other specialty residents puts family practice residents at the forefront for clinical exposure and hands-on experience. Chilliwack also happens to be home to the first integrated clinical clerkship in BC. Its presence has enhanced resident training by introducing teaching and mentorship roles early on. We are constantly working to improve our program. With the growth of our community and subsequent increase in specialists, residents are able to receive high-quality core experiences in Chilliwack. An ongoing mission for residency excellence has created many learning opportunities that have allowed residents to stay locally for the majority of their FP training.
The family practice experience in Chilliwack is an elegant mix of broad-spectrum primary care and acute inpatient medicine. Longitudinal experiences are encouraged through half days back in the family practice office, which provides excellent continuity in patient care and resident education. In addition to great teachers, our family practice preceptors are leaders and pioneers in implementing EMR, advanced access strategies, and improved outpatient care in chronic-disease patients. Recently, the Chilliwack Division of Family Practice negotiated a unique inpatient hospital care program to support and maintain family doctors caring for their patients and orphan patients in hospital. This speaks to the local attitude towards maintaining full-spectrum general practice within a medium-size community. The majority of patients’ MRP are family doctors. The relationships within the medical community truly are collegial, supportive and cooperative. This creates an outstanding environment for family medicine residency training. This community will provide you with an amazing residency experience.
A unique feature of this program is the longitudinal hospital call and emergency medicine exposure. Hospital call over the two years provides residents with the opportunity to assess and manage patients who develop new medical problems during their hospital stay. Residents are also provided with regular emergency medicine shifts as part of their evening call schedule. Our graduating residents consistently inform us that these longitudinal experiences are key in acquiring the skills to practice wherever and whichever style of family medicine they choose.
An exciting recent addition to our program is a focus on addictions medicine. A core two-week rotation in Surrey has been implemented as well as adjusting the psychiatry rotation to maximize involvement in the addictions services of Chilliwack. The goal is to provide an opportunity for residents to gain skills that will enhance their ability to manage patients with addiction as their main diagnosis.
Although not all of our preceptors are currently practicing obstetrics, residents gain obstetrical experience in a variety of ways at our site. These experiences ensure that all residents obtain basic competence in obstetrics. For those residents planning to make obstetrics part of their future practice, they will typically seek out an additional elective experience to enhance their skills. We are excited to see the outcome of a newly implemented pilot project that creates better longitudinal obstetrical exposure.
Chilliwack is a welcoming medical community. The resident role in the community and hospital is well defined. This facilitates learning and a sense of belonging in the medical community. Residents are well received by patients and the community of Chilliwack.
Residents have come from Chilliwack from all parts of Canada. Consequently, every resident forms a close-knit bond that provides social and professional support to one another.
The community of Chilliwack and the surrounding area offers a large selection of recreational pursuits including hiking, mountain biking, fishing, skiing, rock climbing, a new cultural center, new YMCA and two city-operated recreational complexes. Residents are encouraged to enhance their experience by engaging in the many opportunities Chilliwack has to offer. I trust this information is helpful to make you consider Chilliwack as an option when choosing your family practice residency site.
Dr. Alison Henry , MD, CCFP
About
Contact: nicolas.wiewel@fraserhealth.ca
CaRMS Page (CMG)
CaRMS Page (IMG)
Click here to view the site presentation.
Learn more about the City of Chilliwack here. Further details on recreation activities are here and here.
Lead Resident Message
As the first community based training site in UBC, Chilliwack has a strong history of preparing new doctors for full service family practice! Our residents come from across the country, attracted by the reputation of our graduates; they are highly competent and confident in their abilities to practice in rural and remote communities across the country, and have great success in pursuing additional training if this is of interest to them. If you want to be confident in the family practice office, emergency room, inpatient care setting, and the labour and delivery suite, you should seriously consider training in Chilliwack. Here are a few of the highlights of our program:
Excellent learning environment
Chilliwack General Hospital is a friendly community hospital largely run by family doctors who have an extremely collegial relationship both with each other and with local specialists. We quickly operate on a first-name basis with the nurses, preceptors and specialists. The size of the catchment area (approximately 100,000) affords ideal volume and significant pathology while maintaining its community hospital feel, without the dilution of educational experiences that academic teaching centres can develop.
Continuous emergency department exposure
This has always been a strong component of the program and currently includes regular evening emergency shifts throughout the two years, a month-long core emergency medicine rotation, a 2 week pediatric emergency rotation in Vancouver as well as elective opportunities (locally, at larger teaching centres, or internationally). Similar opportunities exist for longitudinal obstetrics for interested residents.
Hospital Call
Another core component of our program is our hospital call. As one of the last hospital in the Fraser Valley where family doctors care for their own in-patients, we gain a lot of training in in-patient care. Our program allows us to assume as much responsibility as we are willing and able to handle while providing reliable and quick backup for situations beyond our abilities. These are the principles behind our hospital call, when we are the one MD in-house responsible for the 200 admitted patients. This is the one of the most challenging parts of our program but is of huge benefit in preparing us for in-patient and emergency care in our future practice, offering development of independent management skills with back-up only a phone call or short drive away.
Fewer learners and dedicated preceptors
Except for the odd elective student and occasional surgical resident, the only medical learners at CGH are 17 FP residents and six medical students. That means we are frequently first assist, regularly 1:1 with our preceptors, and always have first access to available procedures. A large number of preceptors and family physicians in the community are graduates of the program. This is a testament to the collegial nature or our medical community, and to their dedication to seeing the residency program continue to be a highly respected and valuable training opportunity.
Unique mandatory and elective rotations
Residents in Chilliwack have several very popular, unique mandatory rotations. We learn to provide evidence-based addictions care (including suboxone and methadone prescribing) in Surrey. We have a mandatory block at a high volume pediatric emergency department in Vancouver. We also have a month-long palliative care block allows for the development of in-hospital, in hospice, and at home palliative care skills.
Spectacular recreational opportunities
The Fraser Valley offers incredible hiking, mountain biking, paddling, fishing, camping, and back-country skiing, with easy access to world-class ski resorts. If your taste runs more towards top-end shopping malls, theatre, and classy martinis, then Vancouver is merely 75 minutes away by car.
Friendly, close-knit group of resident colleagues
Being a relatively small site, the group of residents in Chilliwack is very supportive. Residents moving from across Canada proudly claim to have “instant friends” within the first week of their residency, and become our chosen family in our new home. We regularly organize social nights, outdoor activities, weekend trips, resident retreats (call protected) to name a few, and have a great time together.
If you hate big-city traffic and crowds, you appreciate knowing and liking the people you work with, and you would like to be a confident full-service family physician, then Chilliwack is the place for you
Please feel free to contact us or the program should you have any other questions about our amazing program!
Dr. Mia Mitchell & Dr. Christine O’Keefe
